Art LaborJrai Dew, 2016-ongoing, installation view, Blut Grieng, 2016.
Photo: courtesy of the artists

Art Labor: Communal Land Protection in the Face of Industrial Extraction

Established in 2012, Art Labor is a collective based in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. The three core members are artists Thao Nguyên Phan and Truong Công Tùng, and “art labourer” Arlette Quýnh‑Anh Trân. Since its creation, the collective has worked closely with the Jarai people — an Indigenous community in the Central Highlands of Vietnam — to develop ongoing cross-disciplinary projects. Following the implementation of the Đôi Mói reforms in 1986, Vietnam moved from a centrally planned economy to a socialist-oriented market economy. This shift drove the agricultural sector into fast-paced industrialization and modernization due to increased demand from international trade. It also brought many Vietnamese farmers and foreign corporations to the Central Highlands, displacing native communities.¹ 1 - Peter Boothroyd and Pham Xuan Nam, Socioeconomic Renovation in Viet Nam: The Origin, Evolution, and Impact of Doi Moi (Ottawa and Singapore: International Development Research Centre, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2000), 28.

As a result of those profound transformations, the Jarai people have been front-row observers of the damage caused by coffee, rice, and rubber farming in the region. Operating within a creative framework, Art Labor examines the influence that colonization and globalization have exerted on the current agricultural landscape. Its projects thus function as a space for rumination on the future of agrarian communities, steering toward a renewed communal relationship between the land and its inhabitants.

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